​

Improve your interactions with AI by learning all about prompt management for Large Language Models.​

​

LLMs or Large Language Models have come a long way. They have become assistants in our day-to-day activities whether it is personal work like financial planning or professional work such as coding or analyzing data, LLMs are proficient across all domains. These AI marvels have revolutionized how we process and generate human-like text, but their true potential lies in how we communicate with them. We communicate with them through prompts. Prompts hold the key to unlocking the full potential of these sophisticated AI models.

In this article, we’ll discuss the value and effect of LLM prompts. We’ll explore what they are, why they are important, and how mastering them can significantly improve your AI interactions. Whether you’re a curious beginner or a seasoned AI enthusiast, understanding prompt engineering and management will allow you to harness the true power of language models.

In this article, we will cover:

What are LLM prompts and why do they matter to producing relatable results or content?Understanding what makes up an LLM prompt, including the important idea of tokenization.We will understand the role of prompts and how to manage them, covering everything from creating prompts to checking or evaluating how well they work.We look at some helpful tools that make working with prompts easier.The best practices to develop good prompts

What are LLM Prompts?

Prompts are input text that guides the LLM to produce or generate answers. It can be considered as an instruction as well. These instructions can be in a form of questions, descriptions, assertions, examples, comparisons, etc. Prompts can be as simple as a single word or as complex as a detailed set of instructions.

Prompts are the crucial driving force behind every output, whether it is image, video, text, analysis, code etc. It is essential to keep in mind that all prompts can generate content but a well-structured and a logical prompt can generate factually correct and creative responses. As such, prompt engineering holds a key to generating creative, accurate, logical, and contextual responses. It allows you to extract valuable information from the LLMs. We will discuss prompt engineering in a later section.

Generally, LLMs are intelligent data storage and retrieval systems where the information is encoded and stored based on word or sentence similarity. An efficient way to retrieve any information from the LLM is to write prompts that can find similar or contextual information and present that information in a meaningful, creative, and understandable way. A good prompt will not only retrieve relevant information but present that information with a blend of simplicity, richness of details, accuracy, and understandability. Using prompts you can even:

Solve complex problems step-by-stepCreate new ideas by mixing conceptsExplain difficult topics in simple terms

In a nutshell, prompts make an LLM a logical and creative retrieval system.

Prompt Components

Now, let’s understand the major components of the prompts. Understanding these components can help you write better prompts.

A typical LLM prompt consists of four main components:

Context: It refers to background information that helps or guides the model to understand the task at hand. For example, “You are a strength conditioning trainer…”Instruction: A clear instruction telling the model what to do or generate. For example, “… prepare an exercise plan for a half-marathon which is 14 weeks away. Help me plan a one-hour morning run with various running drills and use the weekends for long run sessions. Plan the strength exercises in the evenings…”Input Data: This involves specific information that the model should use to generate its output. For instance, “Keep in mind that I am a 30 years old male, 6 ft. tall, weighing 71 kgs…”Output Indicator: A cue that tells the model when to start generating its response. This can also tell the model in what format it should generate the response. For instance, “… Provide a weekly schedule in bullet points…”

These four components will help you to create better prompts but they are not required all the time. It is a good starting point. We must keep in mind that most of the time a single prompt will never give you the desired output, especially in a complex task such as planning and learning. In such cases, to achieve a desired output a chain of prompts must be given after studying the model’s reply and iteratively adjusting the prompt. These prompts help us refine, align, and structure the output based on our needs.  

However, writing prompts becomes much more effective when we understand the importance of tokenization.

Tokenization and Its Importance

Tokenization is the process of breaking down words into subwords also known as “tokens”. These tokens can be words, subwords, or even individual characters.

Visualization of tokens | Source: A study on Attention mechanism

Tokenization is crucial for LLMs because they process and generate text based on these tokens. The data that is used to train the LLMs is converted to tokens, then they are fed to the LLMs. So the LLMs performance largely depends on the type of method used to tokenize the dataset.

Models use several tokenization techniques, such Byte Pair Encoding (BPE), Tiktoken, and WordPiece to generate their vocabulary. To put it briefly, BPE essentially starts by breaking a word or sentence at the character level. It then iteratively combines the most common character pairs from the sentence. At each iteration, it will continue to combine the previous character pair with the current character pair. This iterative process allows BPE to handle both common, rare words and even neologisms. Neologisms are new words which derive from greek work ‘neo’ meaning new and ‘logos’ meaning word. Now, lets see how BPE works generally. For instance, consider the sentence “low lower lowest”. BPE starts by:

Character level separation “l, o, w, l, o, w, e, r, l, o, w, e, s, t”Finding a common appearing pair “ow” and joining them “l, ow, l, ow, e, r, l, ow, e, s, t”In the following finding and merging another character pair “low, low, e, r, low, e, s, t”In the end, we might get “low lower low est”

This methodology allows BPE to split the words into manageable chunks making BPE efficient with LLMs.

Tiktoken is developed by OpenAI. It is mostly employed to provide effective text processing by using predefined vocabulary. It is build on top of BPE and focuses on common subwords and characters for splitting. For instance, the sentence “I love machine learning” might be tokenized as [“I”, ” love”, ” machine”, ” learning”].

WordPiece expands a vocabulary by choosing the most common subwords. It tries to balance between having whole words and useful parts of words as tokens. For instance, “unaffable” might be tokenized as [“un”, “aff”, “able”], where each part is a meaningful subword.

So, how understanding the role of tokenization and the method used can help us craft high-value prompts?

Understanding tokenization helps craft better prompts in several ways:

Token limits

Each LLM has a maximum output token limit. It is the maximum number of tokens that the model uses to generate output for every prompt. Remember that the max output token considers both the prompt length and the output length. For instance, let’s assume the model has a maximum token limit of 6000 tokens. Now if you want to rephrase a context with 4000 tokens then the model will generate a rephrased context by making use of the remaining 2000 tokens. In such cases, the information is lost.

Knowing how words break into tokens lets you make the most of this limit. You can fit more useful info in your prompt. These are especially useful when you want to generate larger content. Understanding token limits can help you craft smaller and more efficient prompts to generate contextual content in a much more controlled manner. So knowing the token limit is a must because it can help you generate content phase by phase. You can know the limit by parsing a prompt with a tokenizer before submitting. This practice is helpful as it shows you exactly how many tokens your prompt uses which can help you avoid hitting unexpected token limits. Also, it helps you optimize your prompt to fit within the model’s capacity.

It’s useful for estimating costs if you’re paying per token. Below is the list of the most popularly used LLM API along with their output token limit:

Claude 3.5 Sonnet: 8,192 tokensClaude 3 Opus: 8,192 tokensClaude 3 Haiku is 4096 tokensOpenAI GPT-4o: 4,096 tokensOpenAI GPT-4: 4,096 tokens and 8,192 tokensOpenAI o1-preview: 32,768 tokensOpenAI o1-mini: 65,536 tokensVisual explanation of how output tokens works in OpenAI O1 model | Source: OpenAI

To understand how these models work let’s consider this scenario where you decide to generate content on a Marketing Campaign. You decide to use Claude 3 Opus, which has an 8,192 token limit, to help generate various marketing materials. For instance, you want to create a comprehensive product description, FAQs, and social media posts. Here’s how understanding token limits can help:

Initial attempt: You input the entire product brief, consisting of 4,000 tokens.  You then ask for comprehensive explanations, frequently asked questions, and social media posts. Assume the estimated number of tokens is 9,000 (4,000 + 2,000 + 2,000 + 1,000). Because it exceeds the 8,192 token limit, the model stops mid-generation during the inference.Optimized approach: Understanding the token limit will help you break the task into phases:

a. Phase 1: Input product brief with 4,000 tokens and request detailed description with 2,000 tokens. Total: 6,000 tokens
b. Phase 2: Input condensed product info with 1,000 tokens and request 10 FAQs with 2,000 tokens. Total: 3,000 tokens
c. Phase 3: Input key product points with 500 tokens and request 5 social media posts with 1,000 tokens. Total: 1,500 tokens

All content is generated successfully, maintaining context and quality.

Context retention and hallucination prevention

When you often ask the LLM to generate longer content it loses the initial contextual knowledge and starts to hallucinate – incorrect or made-up content. Breaking long tasks into shorter parts helps. It lets you refresh the context often. This keeps the LLM on track and reduces errors. For example, when writing a long article, ask for an outline first. Then expand each section separately. This method maintains accuracy throughout the piece.

Word choice

Some words tokenize into fewer pieces than others with similar meanings. Picking these words can make your prompt more compact and effective.  Look at the image below for a better understanding.

Comparing two sentences for efficient token usage | Source: Author using Lunary.ai

Special tokens

Models often have special tokens like [START] or [END]. Using these correctly can guide the model better.  Special token usage can be found in the documentation of the LLM provider. For instance, you can see the documentation of Claude models here, Mistral models can be found here, and OpenAI models here.

To get a thorough understanding of special tokens consider a prompt without special tokens: “Write a short story about a robot learning to paint. The story should be exactly 3 sentences long”.

Prompt with special tokens: “[INST] Write a short story about a robot learning to paint. The story should be exactly 3 sentences long. [/INST]

[START]
1.
2.
3.
[END]”

Multilingual use

Different languages tokenize differently. This matters when making prompts for various languages or mixing languages.

Rare words

Uncommon words might split into many tokens, making prompts less efficient. This happens because LLMs use a generalized tokenizer for all types of input. Separately, when working on specialized tasks (like genome engineering), the LLM might not understand certain domain-specific vocabulary. This lack of understanding, rather than the tokenization itself, may lead to inaccurate responses and the model may even hallucinate. Using more common terms when possible can make your prompt both more token-efficient and potentially more accurate.

A good reason to be mindful of rare words is that they can quickly consume your token budget without adding proportional value. For example, a highly technical term might use 5-10 tokens, while a more common synonym might only use 1-2. In longer prompts, this difference can add up significantly, potentially limiting the amount of context or instruction you can include.

Example:
Consider these two prompts asking about a medical condition: “Explain the symptoms of keratoconjunctivitis sicca.”

“Explain the symptoms of dry eye syndrome.”

Visualization showing how rare words use more tokens in domain-specific tasks. Image a., show GPT-4 will use 14 tokens for the first prompt with rare words while image b., will use 9 tokens for simplified prompt.  | Source: Author generate using OpenAI token counter

While both refer to the same condition, the first prompt uses a rare medical term that might be tokenized into several pieces (e.g., “kera-to-conjunctiv-itis-sicca”), potentially using 5 or more tokens. The second prompt uses a more common term (“dry eye syndrome”) that might only use 3-4 tokens.

If you’re working with a limited token budget, the second prompt allows you to include more context or ask for more detailed information while using fewer tokens. However, in a specialized medical context, using the precise term “keratoconjunctivitis sicca” might be necessary for accuracy.

Using more common terms when possible can make your prompt both more token-efficient and potentially more accurate. However, it’s crucial to balance this with the need for precision in specialized fields. When technical terms are necessary, consider providing a brief explanation or context to help the model interpret them correctly, even if they’re tokenized into smaller pieces.

Prompt structure

Understanding tokenization helps you organize your prompt’s parts (context, instruction, examples) more effectively within the token limit.

Cost control

Many services charge per token. Efficient tokenization can lower costs.

Table showing the cost per token usage for both input and output from various APIs | Source: Author

By grasping these points, you can craft prompts that work better with how the model actually processes text.

Understanding the Role of LLM Prompts

We have already established the role of prompts in guiding the output of LLMs. Now let us explore and understand the other aspects of the prompts.

Prompt influenc on the LLM

The content and structure of a prompt directly influences the quality and nature of the generated text. Well-crafted prompts with a logical flow of instructions can lead to more accurate, relevant, and context-appropriate responses. This is because the attention mechanism in the LLM puts more emphasis on the important word of the prompt. The emphasis on important words arises from the arrangement of the words in the prompts. These important words provide context to the LLM and enable them to generate relatable content.

Recent studies have also shown how certain words in prompts impact LLM results. Researchers can evaluate a word’s statistical impact on the model’s responses by changing it. By using this method, LLMs become more explainable and users can comprehend the various ways that prompt elements contribute to the created text.

Authors conclude that “By employing the “word importance” method, stakeholders can identify which words in the prompts significantly influence these outputs in different ways and utilize alternative words in prompts to ensure more neutral and accurate outputs, and inform practitioners on the potential biases introduced by certain prompt words”

The illustration shows how the scoring function method can allow you rate words based on importance | Source: Word Importance Explains How PromptsAffect Language Model Outputs

But it is also true that a poorly designed prompt may result in irrelevant, inconsistent, or even nonsensical outputs.

Prompt sensitivity and impact on the LLMs

LLMs are highly sensitive to subtle changes in prompt wording. Even minor variations in the prompt can lead to significant differences in the generated output. This sensitivity highlights the importance of careful prompt design and iterative testing to ensure the desired results are achieved consistently. For instance, consider these slight variations in prompts:

“Explain the benefits of exercise” vs. “Describe the advantages of physical activity””Write a story about a space adventure” vs. “Craft a tale about an interstellar journey”

While these prompt pairs convey essentially the same meaning to humans, they might produce distinctly different outputs from an LLM. The variations in vocabulary and phrasing can influence the model’s interpretation of the task, potentially affecting the tone, level of detail, or focus of the generated content.

This sensitivity arises from the way LLMs process and respond to language patterns they’ve encountered during training. They can detect and react to nuances in wording that might seem trivial to human readers but can significantly shape the model’s output. For instance, if we are not careful with words like shouldn’t and should we might end up getting different altogether.

Example of prompt sensitivity where the user used “should” instead of “shouldn’t” | Source: Author generated using Claude Sonnet 3.5 by Anthropic

Prompt-based fine-tuning techniques

Fine-tuning is a technique used to adapt pre-trained LLMs to specific tasks or domains. Prompt-based fine-tuning involves training the model on a dataset of input-output pairs, where the inputs are prompts, and the outputs are the desired responses. Sometimes instructions are added to the input-output pair to guide the model to a better response. This type of fine-tuning is known as instruction-based finetuning. This process allows the model to learn patterns and associations specific to the task at hand, resulting in improved performance and more relevant outputs.

Flowchart of instruction-based finetuning | Source: LLM fine-tuning with instruction prompts

Some popular prompt-based fine-tuning techniques include:

ReAct PromptingConstitutional AI Prompting

ReAct Prompting
Reason and Act or ReAct is a method that combines thinking and doing. When a prompt is given the LLM uses it to form a task. It then uses a special prompt format that encourages the LLM to alternate between thoughts, actions, and observation. Let’s learn how ReAct will work when asked a question from the Harry Potter series.

Prompt: Can you tell me the importance of Platform 9¾ in Harry Potter

Response using ReAct:
Thought 1: I need to find information about Platform 9¾ in the Harry Potter series.
Act 1: Search [Platform 9¾ Harry Potter] in internal knowledge.
Obs 1: Platform 9¾ is a platform at King’s Cross Station in London. This is where the magical students board the Hogwarts Express.

Thought 2: I should get more details about how students access this platform and its importance in the story.
Act 2: Search[How to access Platform 9¾ Harry Potter]
Obs 2: Students access Platform 9¾ by walking straight through the apparently solid barrier between platforms 9 and 10.

Thought 3: I need to understand why this platform is significant to the story.
Act 3: Search[Significance of Platform 9¾ in Harry Potter]
Obs 3: Platform 9¾ is significant because it serves as the gateway between the Muggle and the wizarding world. It’s often Harry’s first experience with magic each school year.

Thought 4: I have enough information to provide a comprehensive answer about the significance of Platform 9¾.
Act 4: Finish[Platform 9¾ is a significant location in the Harry Potter series. It’s a magical platform at King’s Cross Station in London. It is used by Hogwarts students to board the Hogwarts Express. Students access it by walking through the seemingly solid barrier between platforms 9 and 10. Its significance lies in being a gateway between the Muggle and Wizarding worlds, symbolizing the transition students make as they enter the magical realm. For Harry, it often marks the beginning of each magical school year, representing his journey from his mundane life with the Dursleys to the wondrous world of Hogwarts.]

This approach helps the LLM solve problems better. It can make plans and change them as needed. It can also get more information when it has to. This makes the LLMs’ problem-solving clearer to us. ReAct has done well in tests on different tasks. It’s good at answering questions and checking facts. ReAct shows that AI becomes more useful when it can think and act at the same time.

Comparison of Standard, Chain of Thoughts (CoT), Act-only, and ReAct prompting techniques. | Source: ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Models

Constitutional AI Prompting
An approach that incorporates ethical and value-based constraints into the prompts to ensure the model generates socially responsible outputs. This approach is pioneered by Anthropic. It’s like giving the LLM a set of rules or principles to follow. These rules guide the LLM’s responses and actions preventing harmful or biased outputs. The process works in two main steps:

First, the AI is given a task and asked to generate several responses.
Then, it’s asked to pick the best response based on the given rules.

This method helps the AI learn to self-regulate. It can spot its own mistakes or biased thoughts. Then it can correct itself. The goal is to create AI that’s more trustworthy and aligned with human values. It’s like teaching the AI to have a conscience.

Constitutional AI can help with issues like reducing bias, ensuring privacy, and following ethical guidelines.

Prompt Management and its Importance

Once the prompts are created they need to be stored. The process of planning, arranging, and refining the prompts that are used to interact with the LLMs is known as prompt management. Prompt creation, archiving, versioning, and updating are all part of maintaining uniformity and efficacy in LLM-based applications.

But, why do we need to store and manage prompts? Doesn’t each task require a different prompting technique?

While it’s absolutely true that many tasks need custom prompts, storing prompts is still valuable. Why? Because, it gives us a foundation to build on, learn from, and improve over time. Here are some additional reasons:

Reusability: Many tasks share similar elements. Stored prompts can be reused or adapted, saving time and effort. For instance, if you are a freelance web designer working in React then you can have a set of prompt templates for creating different types of websites like Blog, Magazine, Research, etc. Although the requirement for the type of website will be defined by the client the general principle or the workflow will largely remain the same.Learning and Improvement: By keeping a record of prompts, we can study what works best. This helps us get better at writing prompts over time.Consistency in Similar Tasks: For tasks that are alike, using stored prompts ensures consistent results across different uses or users.Version Control: As we improve prompts, we can track changes. This lets us compare different versions and even go back to older ones if needed.Knowledge Sharing: Stored prompts can be shared with team members or the wider community, spreading good practices.Quick Starting Points: Even if a task needs a unique prompt, starting with a stored prompt and tweaking it is often faster than starting from scratch.Quality Control: Having a set of proven, stored prompts helps maintain a baseline of quality in AI outputs.Compliance and Auditing: In some fields, keeping records of prompts used might be necessary for transparency or legal reasons.

So how can we design or write good prompts? For that we will explore the concept of prompt engineering.

LLM Prompt Engineering

In the earlier sections we learned about the importance of prompts, their structure, and their role in guiding the LLM to get the desired output. In this section, we will explicitly understand prompt engineering and various prompt formats.

The process of developing and refining prompts to extract maximum efficiency from LLMs is known as prompt engineering. It involves writing and developing prompts that successfully instruct the model to produce outputs that are relevant, creative, coherent, and of high quality.

Why is Prompt Engineering Important?

Improves LLM Performance: Well-crafted prompts lead to more accurate, relevant, and useful responses.Saves Time and Resources: Efficient prompts can reduce the need for multiple interactions with the model.Enhances User Experience: Better prompts result in more satisfying LLM interactions for end-users.Expands AI Capabilities: Clever prompting can push the boundaries of what LLMs can do. For instance, if you are a researcher in hard-science like Mathematics or Physics you can use the right prompts to understand hard topics and even write a thesis, conduct thought experiments, create hypotheses, and write a research paper based upon it.

To write effective prompts we must also learn the importance of prompt formats.

Prompt Formats

Prompt formats allow you to structure the output in a more logical and desired manner. There are a lot various formats but the five most used ones are:

Zero-shot prompts

When a prompt contains zero examples to get a desired output. For instance, “Classify the sentiment of the following song text by Linkin Park ‘Don’t know why I’m hoping for what I won’t receive. Falling for the promise of the emptiness machine’”. This type of prompt provides only the task instruction without any examples. The idea here is that the model must generate a response based solely on its pre-existing or trained knowledge.

Few-shot prompts

Compared to zero-shot prompts, a few-shot prompting requires a few instances of the desired input-output pairings.

An example of few-shot prompting | Source: Author generation using ChatGPT

Chain-of-thoughts

This refers to instructing the model to break down complex problems into step-by-step reasoning processes.

An example of CoT prompting | Source: Author using ChatGPT

Role-based prompting

This type of prompt is used to assign the LLM to a specific role or persona.

An example of Role-based prompting | Source: Author using ChatGPT

Instruction-based prompting

Instruction-based prompting refers to giving clear, direct instructions to the model about the task it needs to perform. For instance, “write a cover letter for an embedded software engineer with 16+ years of experience.”

Custom LLM Prompts

Custom prompts are tailored to task-specific needs. These prompts are different than general and standard prompts.

For instance, custom prompts are those prompts that are used to generate impactful output for a complex and targeted task like writing, coding, and reasoning compared with standard or predefined prompts. For example, a standard and general prompt would be “Tell me a story” vs “Consider yourself as a sci-fi writer who spends time researching ideas, facts, and hypotheses on quantum mechanics. Write a sci-fi short story about a robot who falls in love with a human. The story should be set on a distant planet and include elements of time travel. Use modern UK English, simple words, nonchalant flow, and short sentences.”

In the example above standard prompt contains a superficial explanation of a task at hand but a custom prompt contains details and a short narrative from the user. Custom prompts follow a pattern that we discussed earlier i.e., the four components of prompts – context, instruction, input data, and output indicator. As such, in the custom prompt above:

Context: “You are a sci-fi writer who spends time researching ideas, facts, and hypotheses on quantum mechanics”.Instruction:  “Write a sci-fi short story…”Input: “…about a robot who falls in love with a human. The story should be set on a distant planet and include elements of time travel.”Output indicator: “Use modern UK English, simple words, nonchalant flow, and short sentences.”

These task-specific prompts are crucial for optimizing the model’s performance and ensuring a more engaging and effective user experience. Also, you can use the same template for many different (writing) tasks.

Some strategies for developing custom LLM prompts include:

Analyzing User Needs:
Conducting thorough user research to understand the specific requirements, preferences, and pain points of the target audience, and incorporating these insights into prompt design.

Example, Standard approach:
“Generate a cover letter for an embedded software engineer with 16+ years of experience.”

Custom approach:
First, ask the LLM: “What are the key elements of an impactful cover letter?”

Then, gather specific information from the user (achievements, top skills, etc.)

Finally, create a prompt like: “Write a cover letter for an embedded software engineer with 16+ years of experience. Highlight their achievement of reducing system latency by 40% and their expertise in real-time operating systems. The tone should be confident yet approachable.“
Domain-Specific Adaptation:
Using a role-based prompting technique will yield a better result. Make sure that you incorporate industry-specific terminology and concepts. And most importantly consider the context and norms of the particular field.

Example: “As a senior embedded systems architect, write a project proposal for implementing a new IoT-based monitoring system in a manufacturing plant. Include sections on hardware selection, network topology, and data security measures.“
Iterative Testing and Refinement: Continuously evaluating the performance of custom prompts through user feedback and quantitative metrics, and iteratively refining them based on the results.
Process:
a. Create initial custom prompt
b. Test with a small user group
c. Analyze responses and user satisfaction
d. Identify areas for improvement
e. Refine the prompt
f. Repeat the process
Contextual Enrichment:
Provide relevant background information in the prompt you can include constraints or specific requirements. Just a side note, as LLMs are not perfect so it is better to anticipate potential inaccuracy and misunderstandings. When inaccuracies occur you should address them preemptively.

Example: “Design a marketing campaign for a new eco-friendly product. The target audience is environmentally conscious millennials. The campaign should focus on social media platforms. Consider current trends in sustainable living and incorporate at least one interactive element.“
Prompt Chaining for Complex Tasks:
This is extremely useful for complex tasks like research and learning, and even routine planning. It is always better to break down complex tasks into a series of simpler prompts. Use the output of one prompt as input for the next. Lastly, ensure coherence between different stages of the process.

Example:
a. Prompt 1: “Analyze the current market trends in renewable energy.”
b. Prompt 2: “Based on the analysis, suggest three innovative product ideas.”
c. Prompt 3: “For the most promising product idea, outline a basic business plan.”

Advanced techniques for custom prompt management

In this section, we will discuss two advanced techniques for custom prompt management. One of these techniques is from Evolutionary Algorithms and other from Reinforcement Learning algorithms. These two techniques will highlight how we can continuously iterate and modify a population of prompts to get the ones which can be more effective.

Evolutionary Algorithms

Recent research like EVOPROMPT have shown how evolutionary algorithms can be combined with LLM to generate high-quality prompts.

But what are evolutionary algorithms?

Evolutionary algorithms (EAs) are optimization techniques. These techniques are inspired by the process of natural selection. In general, an evolutionary algorithm works in the following manner:

Create a population: Start with a group of potential solutions to a problem.Evaluate fitness: Test how well each solution performs.Select the best: Choose the top-performing solutions.Breed new solutions: Combine elements from the best solutions to create new ones.Introduce mutations: Make small, random changes to some new solutions.Form a new generation: Replace the old population with the new solutions.Repeat: Go back to step 2 and continue for many generations.

Over time, this process tends to produce better and better solutions. It’s good for complex problems where traditional methods might struggle.

An example showing how GA creates prompts using the prompt crossover and mutation technique | Source: Connecting Large Language Models with Evolutionary Algorithms Yields Powerful Prompt Optimizers

When applied to prompt engineering for LLMs, EAs offer an effective approach to automatically generate and refine prompts. Keep in mind that all the steps we will discuss will follow the general steps we discussed earlier.

We start with a diverse group of candidate prompts. For instance:

“Write a story about a magical object.””Describe a character who discovers a hidden talent.””Create a narrative set in a futuristic city.””Tell a tale of an unexpected friendship.”

This is our initial population. Each prompt is a potential solution to the task. Through multiple generations, prompts are evolved and refined.

Now, let’s say we evaluate these prompts based on the creativity and engagement of the stories they generate. After testing, we find that prompts 1 and 3 perform best.

We select prompts 1 and 3 as our “parent” prompts for the next generation.

We, now, combine elements from the two parent prompts, this is called crossover:

Parent 1: “Write a story about a magical object.Parent 3: “Create a narrative set in a futuristic city.Offspring: “Write a story about a magical object in a futuristic city.

We introduce small random changes to some prompts through mutation:

Original: Write a story about a magical object in a futuristic city.Mutated: Craft a tale about a sentient technology in a futuristic metropolis.

New Generation: Our new population might look like this:

“Write a story about a magical object in a futuristic city.””Craft a tale about a sentient technology in a futuristic metropolis.””Create a narrative about an ancient artifact discovered in a high-tech world.””Describe a character who finds a mystical device in a cyberpunk setting.”

This process repeats for multiple generations. As it continues, we might see prompts that combine elements in increasingly interesting ways.

After several generations:

“Narrate the journey of a time-traveling AI discovering emotions in a retro-futuristic world.””Write about a telepathic plant’s influence on a hyper-connected society.””Describe the consequences of a reality-altering app in a world where technology and magic coexist.””Craft a story about a character who can manipulate digital dreams in a city where sleep is obsolete.”

Final Evolved Prompt: “In a world where reality and virtual realms blur, write a tale of an ordinary object that gains extraordinary powers, challenging the boundaries between technology, magic, and human consciousness.”

This final prompt combines elements of magical objects, futuristic settings, and thought-provoking concepts about technology and humanity. It evolved from simple initial prompts into a complex, engaging writing prompt that could inspire highly creative stories.

Reinforcement Learning: TEMPERA

TEst-tiMe Prompt Editing using Reinforcement leArning or TEMPERA is a reinforcement learning approach to design interpretable prompts for LLMs.

A flowchart explaining how TEMPERA generates prompts at test time where the agent leverages an attention-based policy. Essentially, the framework uses a reinforcement learning agent to dynamically edit prompts at test time. The agent iteratively refines instructions, in-context examples, and verbalizers for a certain number of rounds to optimize the prompt for each specific query. | Source: TEMPERA: Test-Time Prompting via Reinforcement Learning

It offers a promising direction for automated, query-specific prompt optimization that balances flexibility, efficiency, and interpretability in leveraging LLMs for various NLP tasks.

Let’s learn how TEMPERA helps us to make query-specific prompts. Firstly, it’s important to know that TEMPERA’s strength lies in its query-dependent optimization. The TEMPERA method optimizes prompts to each specific input query at test time. The query is essentially the actual task or question we want the model to handle.

This approach allows for more precise and contextually relevant prompts, potentially leading to improved performance across diverse inputs. For instance, let’s understand this through a topic classification task using the News dataset.

Initial Prompt:
“Classify the news articles into the categories of World, Sports, Business, and Technology.
Example 1: Apple unveils its latest iPhone with revolutionary AI features. Category: Technology
Example 2: Global stock markets plummet amid fears of economic recession. Category: Business
Article: The United Nations calls for an immediate ceasefire in an ongoing conflict. Category: <mask>”

In this prompt, we have provided an instruction, a couple of examples, and an article as a template for the TEMPERA method to optimize. Now, let’s see how TEMPERA will handle this prompt for a specific query:

Query:
“NASA and SpaceX successfully launch the first commercial space station module, paving the way for future space tourism.”

TEMPERA’s editing process:

Instruction edit: The RL agent might decide to make the instruction more specific to handle articles that could potentially fit multiple categories. “Classify news articles into World, Sports, Business, or Technology. For articles that might fit multiple categories, choose the most dominant theme.”Example selection: The agent might choose more relevant examples from its pool, including one that combines multiple categories.
“Example 1: New trade deal signed between US and China, impacting global markets. Category: Business
Example 2: breakthrough in quantum computing could revolutionize cryptography. Category: Technology
Example 3: International Space Station celebrates 25 years in orbit with a global science showcase. Category: World”Verbalizer edit: The agent might change the verbalizers to better match the query’s style and complexity. “Category: <Global Affairs/Athletic Pursuits/Economic Matters/Scientific Advancements>”

Edited Prompt:
“Classify news articles into World, Sports, Business, or Technology. For articles that might fit multiple categories, choose the most dominant theme.
Example 1: New trade deal signed between the US and China, impacting global markets. Category: Economic Matters
Example 2: Breakthrough in quantum computing could revolutionize cryptography. Category: Scientific Advancements
Example 3: International Space Station celebrates 25 years in orbit with a global science showcase. Category: Global Affairs
Article: NASA and SpaceX successfully launched the first commercial space station module, paving the way for future space tourism. Category: <mask>”

In this example, TEMPERA has:

Refined the instruction to address articles that might span multiple categories.Selected more relevant examples that showcase the complexity of category assignment, including one that bridges technology and world news.Changed the verbalizers to more sophisticated terms that might help the model better distinguish between categories in complex cases.

These edits are query-dependent, designed to handle a news article that combines elements of technology, business, and world affairs. The RL agent learns to make these edits based on the reward signal it receives from the language model’s performance on similar complex queries.

Prompt Evaluation and Testing

Evaluating and testing LLM prompts is essential for ensuring their effectiveness and identifying areas for improvement. By systematically assessing the performance of prompts using various metrics and testing methods, you can optimize their prompts for better LLM output quality.

Some common metrics for evaluating prompt effectiveness include:

Relevance: Measuring how well the generated outputs align with the intended purpose and context of the prompt. Relevance can be measured using topic similarity scores which use algorithms such as cosine similarity.Coherence: Assessing the logical consistency and fluency of the generated text. Coherence can be measured using the perplexity score. Lower perplexity score often means more coherent text.Diversity: Evaluating the variety and originality of the outputs generated by the prompt. Diversity can be measured using self-BLEU. It measures how different outputs are from each other.User Engagement: Measuring user satisfaction, interaction time, and other engagement metrics to gauge the effectiveness of the prompt in real-world scenarios.

To thoroughly test LLM prompts, you can employ techniques such as:

A/B Testing: Comparing the performance of different prompt variations and measuring the relevant metrics. Not only that, see if the model doesn’t generate fluffy, nonsensical, and redundant sentences.PromptTools: PromptTools is a set of tools for working with prompts. It helps test prompts in different ways. You can use it to see how small changes affect the results. PromptTools can work with many prompts at once. This makes it useful for big projects with lots of promptsAutomated Prompt Testing Frameworks: Using specialized tools and frameworks to automatically generate test cases, evaluate prompt performance, and identify potential issues or areas for improvement. Below is the list of three prompt testing frameworks:
Promptfoo: It is an open-source prompt testing tool. It helps test prompts for language models. You can use it to make sure your prompts work well. It can run many tests at once. This makes it faster to find good prompts. Promptfoo works with different language models. It can also compare results from different models.
ChainForge: ChainForge is another tool for testing prompts. It lets you create and test prompts visually. This means you can see how changes affect the results. ChainForge is good for trying out different prompt ideas. It helps you find the best way to ask the language model questions. Look at the image below.Image showing the interface of ChainForge that allows you to visualize the performance of the prompts on various LLMs | Source: ChainForge

All these methods, techniques, and approaches are good but where can store and manage these prompts? For that, we need to have proper prompt management tools.

Prompt Management Tools

Prompt management tools help you organize, version control, collaborate on, and analyze the prompts. They make the process of working with LLMs more efficient and streamlined.

Features to Look for in a Prompt Management Tool

Before diving into the tools, it’s essential to understand the key features that any effective prompt management tool should offer:

Version Control: It must allow tracking changes, rolling back to earlier versions, and keeping a well-organized history of modifications. This will ensure clarity and consistency.Collaboration: The tool should support real-time collaboration and enable multiple users to work together on prompts. Additionally, tools must support sharing feedback, and leave comments, enhancing teamwork and knowledge sharing.Analytics: Built-in analytics is crucial for evaluating prompt performance and user engagement. These insights help developers fine-tune their prompts based on data.LLM Integration: It should seamlessly integrate with popular large language models, making it easy to import, export, and test prompts within preferred systems.Security and Access Control: Strong security measures and fine-grained access controls are vital to protect sensitive data and ensure compliance with relevant standards.

Overview of Prompt Management Tools

There are several popular prompt management tools available. We will discuss the three most widely used tools — Langchain, HumanLoop, and Langfuse:

Langchain

Source: Langchain

Langchain is an open-source framework that offers an extensive toolkit for creating LLM-based apps. It provides many features for quick management, such as:

Prompt templates: Langchain allows developers to create reusable prompt templates that can be easily customized for different tasks or domains.Chaining: The library supports combining multiple prompts together to create more complex and dynamic interactions with LLMs.Memory management: Langchain provides tools for managing conversation history and context, enabling more coherent and contextually relevant LLM responses.Integration with LLMs: You can integrate APIs from various LLM providers such as OpenAI, Huggingface, etc.

Humanloop

Source: Humanloop

Humanloop is a prompt engineering platform that focuses on enabling teams to work together effectively. With Humanloop you can create, share, and optimize prompts for various LLMs. Its key features include:

Collaborative workspace: Humanloop offers a shared workspace where team members can instantly create, modify, and comment on prompts.Version control: Teams may go back to earlier iterations of the platform if necessary because it keeps a clear history of all changes made to the prompts and automatically tracks them.Analytics and insights: Humanloop has built-in analytics tools that shed light on user interaction, prompt performance, and other pertinent information.Integration with popular LLMs: It also supports integration with various LLMs.

Langfuse

Source: Langfuse

Langfuse offers an end-to-end prompt management solution with a user-friendly interface. Its key features include:

Visual prompt builder: Langfuse provides a drag-and-drop interface for creating prompts. This makes it easy for you to design and customize prompts without extensive coding knowledge.Testing and debugging tools: The platform includes built-in tools for testing prompts, debugging issues, and optimizing performance.Deployment and integration: Langfuse offers seamless deployment options and integration with various LLMs and other tools in the AI ecosystem.Collaboration features: The platform supports team collaboration, allowing multiple users to work on prompts simultaneously and share feedback.

By leveraging these tools you can more effectively manage your prompts and streamline your workflows. Also, you will also be able to develop more robust and efficient LLM-based applications with these capabilities. Every tool has distinct advantages and skills, so it’s critical to assess them according to your own requirements and specifications.

Best Practices for Effective Prompt Management

Prompt management is important for anyone or teams who work with LLMs. Sometimes we want to store and share effective prompt templates with others. In that case, we might also be interested in monitoring the performance of the prompt template and modifying it accordingly and also based on the users’ feedback who are using the prompts and the prompt templates.

With that in mind, let’s discuss some of the best practices for effective prompt management.

Keep a changelog and version history
It is always necessary to keep a detailed change log and version history for your prompts. This will help you to track modifications, understand the evolution of your prompts, and facilitate collaboration among team members.

Use version control tools to track changes and maintain a clear history of modifications.Include detailed commit messages that explain the purpose and impact of each change.Regularly review the change log to identify patterns and opportunities for improvement.

Monitor Usage and Performance Metrics Continuously
Monitoring the usage and performance of your prompts is crucial. It helps you to identify areas for optimization and ensure the success of your LLM-based applications.

Track key metrics such as:
User engagement: How do end users are using your prompts? End users can be anyone including yourself or team members with whom you’ve shared your prompts.
Output quality: How well the LLM is responding to your prompt. Check its coherence using the perplexity score.
Response times: How quickly does the LLM answer? Response time is affected by the quality of the prompt. Make sure that the prompt follows a consistent flow of logic as we discussed earlier – context, input data or examples, instruction, and output indicator.Use analytics tools to gain insights into user behavior and identify patterns.
Set up alerts and notifications for abnormal usage patterns or performance issues.

Regularly Evaluate and Iterate on Prompts Regularly
Evaluating the effectiveness of your prompts is a must. Along with that, making sure that you iterate on them based on user feedback and performance data is essential. This allows you to maintain high-quality outputs and improve user experience.

Establish a regular evaluation schedule to assess prompt performance.Gather user feedback through surveys, interviews, and user testing sessions.Analyze performance data to identify areas for improvement and optimize prompts accordingly.Continuously iterate on prompts based on evaluation results and user feedback.

By following these best practices, you can ensure that your LLM prompts remain effective, up-to-date, and aligned with user needs – any end user who will be using your prompts. Incorporating these practices into your prompt management workflow will help you create more powerful and engaging LLM-based applications.

Conclusion

LLMs have changed how we work and live. They help us with all kinds of tasks –  personal to professional. But to get the most out of them, we should know how to talk to them. This is where prompts come in.

Key Takeaways

Prompts are like instructions for LLMs. Good prompts lead to better results.A prompt has four main parts: context, instruction, input data, and output indicator. Knowing these helps you write better prompts.Tokenization matters. It’s how LLMs break down text. Understanding this can help you make your prompts more efficient.Small changes in prompts can cause big changes in output. Be careful when writing prompts.Custom prompts work better for specific tasks. They can make the LLM’s output more useful and relevant.Managing prompts is important. This means keeping track of changes, working together with others, and analyzing how well prompts work.Keep checking and improving your prompts. Use feedback and data to make them better over time.There are advanced ways to make prompts, like using algorithms that mimic evolution or learn from trial and error.Tools like Langchain, Humanloop, and Langfuse can help you manage prompts more easily.